Zoroaster

An Iranian priest taught that the universe is a battleground between a good creator and a destructive force, that history moves toward a final judgment, and that each person's choices count toward the outcome. Where older religions had capricious gods to be appeased, this one had a moral structure with a direction. Under Persian kings it became a state religion, and its ideas — heaven and hell, a coming savior, angels and demons, a final reckoning — spread through the Jewish exiles in Persia and, from there, into Christianity and Islam.